czech republic: day trip from prague

my mom's best friend from childhood picked us up at mom's flat at 10am, with her husband as the driver...they wanted to do a day trip around prague to show me a bit more of the country...i am always keen for day trips :)...they made me sit in the front passenger seat, so i would be able to see everything...
we started by taking back roads to a castle called konopiste...it's not far from prague, but not terribly well known...if i understood correctly, the castle was owned by the serbian family involved in the start of WWI...wow! The family liked to hunt, and the castle is located in a wooded area, there are still hunted animals in the area...behind one fence we could see a couple deer with lovely antlers...who knows, one of them might've been rudolph!

The only way to see the interior of the castle was to take one of three tours, but they seemed rather expensive to me, so i said no...especially because you had to take three different tours to see the entire castle...i didn't have the time or desire for that...i could see part of one interior, with a lot of trophy heads on the walls...remember how i mentioned the family enjoyed hunting?
Instead of a tour, we all walked to the rear of the castle, to check out the landscaped garden...there were at least three peacocks wandering around freely!! after the garden we stopped for a drink break at a small cafe...on the way back to the parkplatz i bought a coffee mug that had no english...and postcards of course...

back in the car we drove for a while, the next stop was in the small town of vrchotovy janovice...i had to repeat after mom at least ten times to get the name right, it isn't easy to say for non slavic language speakers...(i still have the accents wrong, i'm sure)...we all took the tour of the castle, after stopping for a ridiculously large lunch...(mine was six pieces of knedliky and goulash)...if i had known it was going to be such a big portion i would've had mom ask for a half portion...given how much i can eat, that's saying a lot!

the castle has been used by a number of people/groups over history...it was used by a family, it was used as a military barracks, and it was abandoned...the last inhabitant was a single woman with a variety of 'friends'...it is now a museum exhibiting items from the national museum...only one room has objects and photos from the castle itself :(
after the tour i wandered with mom's friend through the unlandscaped area around the castle...it must've been nice to have land to wander on...there is a small pond with ducks, a few trees too...

on the way back to prague we stopped twice...once was at an overlook at a corner of a river...really pretty...apparently we weren't the only ones who thought so, as there is a tiny little cafe with tables set to take advantage of the view...we didn't eat, but i loved looking out over the area...we also stopped by the cabin owned by mom's friends...it was just as it would've been in the old days, including the really old radio...the names of towns listed on the radio for short wave tuning in were mostly in the old east bloc!!
a nice day exploring the area around prague :)

germany: dresden

i was on yet another bus the next day...this was an international bus, going to dresden...i didn't know it before i arrived in prague, but dresden is only two hours from prague by bus...mom said a lot of czechs used to go shopping in dresden for the day, since they could get western clothes there, for reasonable prices, compared to what was available in prague...i don't know how much that still happens, but i was just happy the transportation was easy...this bus company goes to a number of cities in europe, i'd love to use them again :)

dresden was almost completely destroyed by bombing during WWII, and the city has been almost entirely rebuilt in the years since...the historical centre survived though, and i liked the juxtaposition of modern and old architecture so close to each other...the weather during my visit was crappy, raining from time to time...
it was an easy walk from where the bus dropped me off to the historical centre, it was a pedestrian street with a lot of shops...i went into a bakery straightaway, i LOVE german bakeries...i didn't need to buy any of what i did, but it was sooo good!

During the day i wandered around the historical area...i saw the semperopera, (great outside, they offer tours of the inside)...i saw the schloss (the gardens in the middle were pretty, and i loved walking along the tops of the walls all around)...i went in a couple churches, nothing struck me as awesome...normally i love the cool temperatures of churches in summer, but with the wet weather outside, it wasn't a good feeling...my feet were cold :(...for that matter, no part of me felt good, due to the wet weather...yuck yuck yuck...then again, the wet weather was an excuse to step into bakeries a bit more :)

dresden used to have unesco designation, but then lost it...the reason for this is because the city planned to build an ugly bridge very close to the historical centre of the church...the unesco people heard about it and told the city not to build the bridge, as they would be destroying the aesthetic appeal of the centre...the city decided to build the bridge anywho, so they lost unesco designation...i don't think that happens very often! I wonder if the city has noticed a monetary loss as a result...
i walked across one of the bridges, and walked up the street on the other side...

at one end of the street was a golden statue of a guy on a horse...i'm not sure why the statue was a very bright shade of gold, it didn't really fit in with anything...the street was split into two sides, with a park line down the middle...pretty, and nice for walking...
i briefly checked into the building called markethalle, but it wasn't really a market...just small stores without walls in between...there was one produce stand, with nothing cheap...
then it was time to walk back to my bus...i stopped in the bakery again, just because i could...more pastries and hot chocolate, YUM...
mom picked me up at the bus station back in prague...i love having people meet me when i get off a bus or plane, it doesn't happen very often...

czech republic: cesky krumlov

my next visit with mom was an overnight trip...the bus to and from cesky krumlov was 3 hours each way, with free wifi, plugs, and mini personal tvs...it was like being on a long, international flight, yahoo!!!
our first day in cesky krumlov was rainy off and on the entire day...argh...i hate rain...
cesky krumlov is a unesco listed town in the south of czech republic...it's a small town, built on an S-curve of a river...the town is very picturesque, with a castle built out of the rock on the higher side of the river...

we walked from the bus stop to our hotel, with a beautiful view along the way...well, it would've been beautiful if not for the clouds and rain...argh...we were too early to check in, but we were able to drop our bags...
after wandering and hiding from the rain for a while, we stopped for lunch...i had traditional czech food: pork, knedliky, and gravy...after eating we checked in, our room was HUGE!!! somehow we'd gotten a family sized room for the price of a double...there was bed space enough for four people...i loved it:) ...

the owner of the hotel didn't know what language to speak to us, since mom obviously speaks perfect czech, but was also speaking to me in perfectly good english...plus, when the owner spoke some german, mom responded in that language...
after relaxing for a while, we headed out again...we crossed the river and headed up to the castle...we bought tickets to the museum, and up the bell tower...the museum was small, but i liked it...good displays, though the room with the mummy was a bit on the creepy side...(maybe because it was completely unexpected)...

i liked seeing the old photos and clothes...the tiny, steep stairways to get up the bell tower made it a challenge with all the tourists who aren't used to paying attention to anyone else...people don't know how to share public space anymore...
on the way back from the castle we stopped for a drink...mom had beer, i had hot chocolate, and we split a large pitcher of water...after the break we tried to visit st vitus church, but it appeared to be closed...argh...after that disappointment, we decided to have ice cream, then finished off sandwiches for dinner...

the next morning we woke up to great weather, yahoo!! before breakfast i ran around retaking some of the photos i'd taken the day before, so i could have blue skies instead...breakfast was included in our hotel price, we ate in the next door restaurant: cheese slices, bread, salami, ham slices, baguettes, butter, jam, spreadable cheese, salad, tea, and orange juice...
after breakfast we walked to the brewery area of town...we didn't take the tour, so we weren't able to go anywhere past the entry gate...oh well...mom pointed out that the brewery was located on brewery street, hee hee...

the brewery was kinda close to the castle, so i asked mom if i could retake a couple photos there as well...since it wasn't raining, i walked really fast and saw part of the gardens as well, which we hadn't seen the day before...i wondered how big the gardens were...
we next wandered the platz in the middle of the city just for a bit of people watching, then walked over to the old synagogue...i didn't like the art display set up in the middle, but i enjoyed the building itself...the stained glass window was very nice...
after the synagoge we had lunch (i had salad, since it felt like we'd been eating almost constantly) then picked up our bags from the hotel...we walked back to the bus stop, and caught the bus back to prague...my plug didn't work this time, but wifi did :)

czech republic: kutna hora

mom and i visited kutna hora on another day trip from prague...we left the flat at 0715, to get to the train station on time for our 0800 train...sitting across from us on the train was a chick from san francisco, who was traveling europe for a couple weeks...after arriving in kutna hora we figured out we had to take another, tiny little regional train to get to where we wanted to be...thank goodness for information offices in small towns...(and thank goodness mom was able to figure it out without taking time to wait in a queue)...this tiny little train took us to a place called sedlec...

we hopped off, and walked...we first passed a church with an open door, so we ducked in...we weren't the only people looking around, since the open door made everyone think it was open for visitors...an employee (or maybe volunteer?) came to tell everyone that the church wasn't yet open, and pointed to a board showing opening times...the board did indeed show the opening time to be an hour later, but the time the guy said was half an hour after that...we all left, and i wonder if anyone went back...i also wonder what time the church actually opened...
mom and i were among the first visitors to arrive at the ossuary...the ossuary is well known, and is probably the biggest reason people make this day trip...it was a lot smaller than i expected, but still pretty stunning...the entire room is decorated with bones...i've forgotten how many people's bones are used, but the number is big...decorations on the wall, a chandelier, and a shield of sorts...(a coat of arms)...plus a couple giant piles of bones in the general shape of pyramids...

i'm glad mom and i were some of the first to arrive, otherwise we never would've been able to take any photos without people in them...
we just missed the next tiny little train, so we had to wait a while at the tiny little train stop...it was a very sunny day, i was sweating like crazy, but oh well...the following train came along and took us to the city centre of kutna hora...(i think the ossuary is technically located in a suburb called sedlec, but most people call the entire area kutna hora)...

mom had read that we could take tours of a former royal mint, so that was where we went first...this is when i learned that the english word dollar originally came from this area, when they called a certain coin a thaler...give it a few years, then a different language and soon enough the word becomes dollar...i like the museum display of coins/money that had been produced and used in the area...another part of this tour took us through a residence area of the castle...it was small, but i loved the way the rooms were decorated...i wasn't a big fan of the personal chapel, it wasn't my style...

all the streets in the city centre were uneven cobblestone...it was tough enough for us in the middle of summer, i bet the roads are treacherous in winter with snow and ice...kutna hora is small though, i doubt there is a huge amount of traffic in winter...
we visited the former jesuit college, it is now an art gallery...a big art gallery...one room remained as it used to be, when it was an apotheke...we could see the ceiling painting, but that was the only bit of note...the gallery was huge...we kept thinking we'd seen everything, but in the end we ended up skipping the top floor, we were both tired of art...

i can see it as a good place to come for a specific exhibit, but not to see the entire thing at once...apparently a lot of people come to the gallery and try to sneak in without entry tickets, because our tickets were checked no less than four different times during our visit!
we also visited st barbara's cathedral...it was never finished, but you would never know that, as it is huge, and doesn't look or feel unfinished...when you enter they give you information sheets with specific aspects of the church...i read a bit, but all the information was really detailed, and it got to be a bit overwhelming...i think audioguides were also available...behind the main altar there were quite a few smaller chapels/altars...

after the cathedral we stopped for tea/coffee and chocolate mousse cake...a nice break, and tasty :)
from there it was easy to get back to the mini train station, then the main station in kutna hora, then back to prague..

czech republic: telc

one morning mom and i were out the door at 0715 so we could catch the metro to the bus station...the ride to telc was almost four hours, though it was only supposed to be three hours...somehow the bus ended up on back roads, due to some detour...i think we surprised a few of the locals as the bus went through :)...it also surprised mom to hear people on the bus telling the driver how to do his job...(this didn't happen when she was growing up)...apparently he was fairly new on the job and didn't quite know where to go...

telc is a unesco listed town, the platz in the middle of town is very picturesque...i think it was founded in medieval times?
not all the buildings are used as they once were, and not all of them are inhabited anymore, probably because of cost...mom pointed out a few that weren't inhabited anymore, you could see there aren't any curtains in the windows anymore...
it probably costs a lot to live in one of these places, and you can't modernize things very easily...both of us wondered what the place will be like in 10-20 years, as the town is small, and th ere is nothing else happening...

at one end of the big square, (which isn't really shaped like a square at all) are the bell tower of a church, and the castle...mom had already been up the bell tower and didn't feel the need to go again, but i was keen...plus, my knees are good with stairs for another decade, i might as well get a workout:)...the town is small, i could see farmland really close!
we went in the boundaries of the castle, but opted not to take any of the interior tours...i liked wandering the gardens, though they were small...
several times during the day we stopped to sit and eat...once was ice cream, another time for tea, and a third time for an early dinner/late lunch...

to kill time before catching the bus back to praha we wandered one of the 'normal' city streets...absolutely nothing worth seeing, i couldn't even figure out a photo to take...
the bus ride back was crazy too, but in a different way...this time the bus driver was a wannabe fire truck driver...apparently he had had that training, and figured you could drive a bus that way aswell...i suppose it's physically possible, but probably not the best idea...i wasn't car sick (surprisingly,) but i wasn't feeling very safe either, as he was careening around curves and always going faster than any of the passengers felt was safe...the passengers yelled at this guy too, mom found it even more amusing...

italy: salerno, paestum, and naples

my host was traveling out of country the next day, so i moved into naples...i'd made a reservation at a guesthouse, and though i arrived too early to check in, i was able to leave my bags for the day...

from there i went to the train station and caught a train to salerno...when i checked one ticket machine, it said the next train wasn't for two hours, but i figured out that was the next express fancy train...the next regional train was only 40 minutes later...not only was this train sooner, it was a LOT cheaper...why do people wait longer for a more expensive train? especially when the earlier train is only 30 minutes?!?!

when i first arrived in salerno, i walked along the seafront for a while...it was pretty, and quiet...i felt totally at peace...the boats were all waiting in their docks, the bay curves around so you can see the hills behind the city...

eventually i moved into the old city area, where the streets are small, it's easy to get lost in the maze of streets...i found the duomo, which isn't nearly as well known as it should be...it's HUGE, and airy, the mosaic decoration inside is awesome...you're not supposed to take photos, but i snuck one when i was in the crypt...stunning...

outside the church is a nice courtyard with a plant decoration in the middle...it was built by the normans in the 11^th century, and dedicated to san matteo...so quiet, so awesome...i wish i could've climbed up the bell tower, i bet the view is awesome...

i took the train back to naples, checked into the guesthouse, then started walking again...i found the via de tribunale, one of the main tourist drags of the city...somehow, it wasn't as busy as i remember it being in december...maybe i was walking at a different time of day, or there really arent as many tourists at the beginning of july...

i found the starting point of one of the underground tours of naples...the tour took everyone through 1 km of the underground aqueduct, built by the romans waaaay back in the day...the area was also used as shelter during the bombing of WWII...some of the tunnels were quite tight, others were much more wide open...as usually happens with being undergound, it was pretty chilly, i wanted long sleeves...

back on street level the tour also took us to where a roman amphitheatre used to be located...by the time the ruins were located, many families had already built homes above...it's wierd to see windows going right into old roman arches...i think the law says the families can't be kicked out, so the ruins will never be fully excavated...

i had a big bowl of mussels for dinner...yum!

The next day i got up very slowly...another carb loaded breakfast included with my room...how do people never want anything but various types of bread for breakfast?

eventually i got back to salerno, and from there took a bus to the ruins of paestum...the bus dropped me at the train station of paestum, which appears to be located in the middle of nowhere...i had to walk a kilometer or two down the road to get to the ruins, it was easy enough...

the ruins of paestum are unesco listed, i expected them to be covered with tourists...they weren't, probably because it takes a couple hours to get there from naples...there are three large temples, all surrounded by fences, but the rest of the ruins aren't protected, and it's difficult to tell what they are...

there are a few signs describing what the ruins in various areas used to be, for the most part i just wandered around...i really liked the mosaic decor on the floors of what used to be upper middle class homes...i reckon the areas not protected will continue falling apart until it isn't possible to see anything identifiable...there is also a museum across the street from the ruins, but i didn't go inside...

back in naples i had mussels for dinner again...two servings this time...YUM! The restaurant tried to charge me for a breadbasket, which i wouldn't have minded if i had actually received the breadbasket...but i didn't, so i wasn't going to pay that charge...

it's a normal part of a restaurant bill in italy to be charged for the breadbasket they put on your table, whether or not you eat the bread...i don't mind that since it's tradition, but i'm not paying for it if i don't even get it...

that night i paid for my guesthouse since i was leaving quite early the next morning...they tried to charge me 10 euros extra, until i showed my booking confirmation...too bad i had to leave before breakfast...the airport bus got me to the airport quite quickly, since there is no traffic at 0615 in the morning :)

italy: pozzuoli and vesuvio

My first train from rimini took me to bologne, where i almost ran through the train station to get my second train...the bologne train station is undergoing some renovation, and the tracks are on three levels...when i had to transfer there on my way to rimini i figured some of it out, but i still found it confusing, and not very efficient when you have to book it from one level to another...my second train went from bologne to napoli, where my friend ken picked me up at the station...yay for door to door service...

on the way home we picked up food for dinner and our excursion the next day...dinner that night was steak on the grill, YUM...a simple, but great meal, looking out over a beautiful bay, during sunset...i don't think it gets any better :)

the next morning we had to get up early to get ready for the day...ken's friend came over to drop off food for the bbq later that evening...the three of us drove to a meeting spot to get everyone corralled, then the convoy drove to sorrento, through the town to the port...

i don't know who had arranged everything, but someone had rented three boats for the whole group to take out for the day...the plan was to spend the day going around the island of capri, celebrating the birthday of the US...

it was a fabulous day...beautiful weather, beautiful people, lots of patriotic clothing...

at one point we saw a superyacht with the stars and stripes, so someone looked up the boat...the limitless is owned by the guy who owns victoria's secret (among others)...it was a BIG BOAT...i'm sure the limitless was greeted by every american in the area who saw the flag :)

during the day the boats stopped a few times to play in the water, jump off rocks, etc...so much fun...id forgotten how much fun it is to play in water, i haven't done it in ages...i put suncream on a couple times, so my sunburn wasn't nearly as bad as i expected...yay :)

after returning home ken started prepping everything for a 4^th of july bbq he was hosting...the first guest to arrive was a french chick, carrying a french flag...i yelled 'allez les bleus' which surprised her, as most of her friends in the area do not speak french or know much about the country...she had the flag because france and germany were playing in another round of the world cup...(a few minutes after she arrived and we put up the flag, a house across the way put up the german flag...i loved the trash talk)

over the rest of the evening people arrived, ate food, talked with each other, took photos, etc...a great time was had by all...i ended up crashing before everyone left, i was so tired...

the next day we took it easy...waking up late, breakfast, watching tv, generally relaxing...i laid out on the balcony, forgetting that my back had already had enough sun...ooops...

the next morning was sunday, and i was wide awake at 0614...we had breakfast, and eventually got on the road...i sortof played tour guide, the guidebook gave vague directions as to how to get to vesuvius...remember when mom and i visited naples in december and i said that during my next visit i wanted to hike vesuvius? That's what we did...

we took an accidental detour, since the highway signs were not terribly clear as to where to exit...after the whole thing was over, we came to the conclusion we'd come up the opposite side of the mountain from what we intended to do...anywho, after driving through a few neighborhoods, we found the mountain, or more specifically, a parkplatz...

from there our options were limited to one: take a 'bus' a good portion of the way up, then walk from there...the path for walking was really loose, i'm glad i was wearing closed toe shoes...it was an easy walk, taking about 15 minutes i think? The views over the side were awesome...

when we got to the top we heard a brief by one of the park rangers...she told us about a few of the worst eruptions of vesuvius, as well as how it is expected to behave in the future...because of the most recent eruption it is no longer possible to walk all the way around the rim, but you can get pretty close...looking down into the middle, you don't see anything liquid...it's hard to imagine how this volcano has caused so much destruction over history...

on the way back, we missed the bus going down, so after hanging out for a while, we started walking...the weather was awesome, why not?

Maybe halfway down another bus came along and made us climb aboard...argh...we'd enjoyed as much walking as we'd been able to do...

back in pozzuoli we found a small hole in the wall cafe for lunch...YUM...it seemed to be family owned, and ken was convinced it had mafia connections...i don't know about that, but the food was fantastic...seafood pasta, YUM...this is the kind of place i want to make 'mine'...i want to come back regularly, so the owners get to know me well, and i never have to worry about ordering a specific meal :)

our late afternoon activity was going to the sulfatora...it's a wide area with natural steam vents...you can wander just about anywhere you want to go, there is almost nothing blocked off...(i kept thinking that in the states everything would be blocked off, you wouldn't be able to get anywhere close)...some of the vents had a very strong sulfur smell, others were just plain hot...i loved the colours of the minerals...

after we got home a couple friends came over for dinner, then we watched a movie called lawless...i love long holiday weekends with good people :)

the next morning we were up to go on another boat...the renting had been done from another port, so we didn't have to drive so far, or go so early...the boating crew this day was smaller, only 6 of us total, on one boat...

this time the boat was driven around the island of ischia...another beautiful island...there are hot springs in a few places around the island, we stopped a few times...one spot was small, and located near a former brothel...(from waaaaaaaaaay back when)...the other springs area was a lot bigger, and filled with people...i soaked up more sun than i needed, but it was worth it...another day when i looked around and knew i get to have an amazing life...

we loved the seafood pasta restaurant so much we wanted to go back...unfortunately it was closed on mondays...argh...

the next day my host went back to work, i enjoyed relaxing around the house for a while before walking into pozzuoli...i like this town, a lot!

Pozzuoli is where you can find the 3^rd largest roman arena in italy...there are also ruins of a temple in another area of town...plus the little port is beautiful, and still used by locals...i saw fisherman fixing their nets, sitting under umbrellas...

i saw several beautiful churches, none of them big...one of the churches i saw entirely by accident, as there was a tour group inside when i walked by, otherwise it would've been closed and locked...

i didn't get to see the cathedral in town, the guys in the information office told me it was closed except on weekends...

it was hot while i was wandering around, but the heat didn't really hit me until i was climbing up the hill to go home...at that point i just wanted to sit down and wait a few hours until my host drove by me on the way home so i could hop in the car...hot hot hot!

When he did get home we wanted to go to a chicken place for dinner, but it was closed for random cleaning...so we went back to the seafood pasta place...yahoooo!

We had a few others with us, and the family remembered us...(more likely, they remembered my friend, cause he is a big guy)...another fantastic meal, this one served family style...seafood pasta, spaghetti bolognese, wine, meat, etc...i felt pregnant when we left, hee hee...

germany kicked brazil's ass that night in football...

the next morning i woke up with an awful headache, and went back to sleep as soon as my host left for work...a few hours later i felt better, got dressed and headed out to see the arena...(it was closed the day before)...it was fun to wander around, there weren't too many other visitors...i wish it was possible to wander around the upper layers as much as the underground areas...

i laid out again that afternoon...since the house is on a hill, there was an awesome breeze, so i never felt hot even though the sun was strong...

i was sad to leave pozzuoli the next day :(